Attorney General Alberto Gonzales’ admission that “mistakes were made” notwithstanding, all the Democratic rhetoric over the removal of eight U.S. attorneys adds up to rank hypocrisy.

News that the White House was involved in the decision to replace the U.S. attorneys – reportedly after complaints from GOP senators that they failed to probe voting fraud – may have “shaken” Sen. Chuck Schumer’s “faith,” as he put it yesterday, while looking stern for the cameras.

But that doesn’t alter the fact that even Schumer, if pressed, would have to concede that U.S. Attorneys are political employees – and, as such, they serve strictly at the pleasure of the president.

And surely Schumer remembers when President Bill Clinton and his attorney general, Janet Reno, ordered all 93 prosecutors to resign in one fell swoop.

Democrats had no problem with that. Nor did any of them complain when it became clear that that decision had been made with White House input.

Indeed, suspicion quickly focused on the fact that among those dismissed was the U.S. attorney who had just advised Reno that he was within 30 days of making the “critical decision” of whether to indict a powerful key Clinton ally, Rep. Dan Rostenkowski of Illinois.

Speculation was widespread that firing the rest of the prosecutors was simply cover, that the White House wanted to buy time for Rostenkowski – who eventually served 15 months in prison – to help push the Clinton agenda through Congress.